The Coding Diaries: HTML

Alright - I’m sick of not knowing proper code because it restricts my creative process when designing websites. While there are tons of sites out there that promote their easy “drag & drop” features and their user-friendly software, as a designer, I actually find these features can be pretty limiting in how I want to display my designs and information. After countless hours spent on YouTube, looking up how to do a specific action in these website-building platforms, I basically found out that in order to make my website completely customizable, I’ve got to know some HTML and CSS. So I decided to add another hobby to my endless list: learning how to code. 

I started with watching YouTube tutorials as there are so many free resources available for people who are teaching themselves code. I watched and followed Dave Gray’s Beginner’s HTML Course and learned a lot but ultimately found it pretty unhelpful when considering how little I retained the information just by copying his work and listening to a four-hour lecture. While the class was definitely a good introduction, I knew that I was just grazing the surface. Not to mention, teaching this skill yourself requires an immense amount of self-discipline. I needed to practice. Daily. If I wanted to learn how to do this effectively and actually learn, I realized I needed a daily dose of immersing myself in the coding world - it’s essentially like learning a language. 

I recently bought a subscription to CodeAcademy.com because of its variety of courses and the structure of courses grasped my interest. Taking quizzes, doing projects, and completing code challenges were more practical methods for making this hobby into a skill. I recently completed the Learn HTML Course and earned my certification through Code Academy. My next steps are learning CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) and iOS development (because why not).

I’m looking forward to learning more coding languages and even more eager to apply my knowledge to better my personal designs and client work. My goal in this coding journey is to both better my skills as a designer and provide my clients with the best possible web designs that fit their needs and aesthetics. In today's digital age, having a website for your company is so important because it not only aids your business credibility, but websites are digital marketing tools that help businesses increase online and in-store traffic and foster growth. 

If you are interested in building a website with me, please fill out my contact form or reach out to me via email!